Harb ibn Saleh Al-Zuhair
Described as a prominent Saudi businessman. Failed to pay tax in France for a number of years. The tax department claimed that Al-Zuhair owed the state 80 million francs in tax for the years from 1996 to 1998. Had his property raided in Feb 2002. Inspectors from the department raided the house, located in Biarritz, last week while Al-Zuhair was present. “They came in four vehicles and a large truck and a police car,” Al-Zuhair told Arab News. Had a meeting with Richard Perle and Adnan Khashoggi, Jan 2003, concerning Iraq and investment in Perle's Company. Khashoggi explained that before Christmas he and Harb Zuhair, the Saudi industrialist, had met with Christopher Harriman and Gerald Hillman in Paris and had discussed the possibility of a large investment in Trireme. Zuhair was interested in more than the financial side; he also wanted to share his views on war and peace with someone who had influence with the Bush Administration. Though a Saudi, he had been born in Iraq, and he hoped that a negotiated, "step by step" solution could be found to avoid war. Zuhair recalls telling Harriman and Hillman, "If we have peace, it would be easy to raise a hundred million. We will bring development to the region." Zuhair's hope, Khashoggi told me, was to combine opportunities for peace with opportunities for investment. According to Khashoggi, Hillman and Harriman said that such a meeting could be arranged. Perle emerged, by virtue of his position on the policy board, as a natural catch; he was "the hook," Khashoggi said, for obtaining the investment from Zuhair. Khashoggi said that he agreed to try to assemble potential investors for a private lunch with Perle. The lunch took place on January 3rd at a seaside restaurant in Marseilles. (Perle has a vacation home in the South of France.) Those who attended the lunch differ about its purpose. According to both Khashoggi and Zuhair, there were two items on the agenda. The first was to give Zuhair a chance to propose a peaceful alternative to war with Iraq; Khashoggi said that he and Perle knew that such an alternative was far-fetched, but Zuhair had recently returned from a visit to Baghdad, and was eager to talk about it. The second, more important item, according to Khashoggi and Zuhair, was to pave the way for Zuhair to put together a group of ten Saudi businessmen who would invest ten million dollars each in Trireme. "It was normal for us to see Perle," Khashoggi told me. "We in the Middle East are accustomed to politicians who use their offices for whatever business they want. Harb al-Zuhair was a beneficial shareholder of a corporation called Arabian Shield Development (now called Arabian American Development Company). At the same time that Harb al-Zuhair was a director and shareholder of Arabian Shield Development, 'Mohammad Salem Ben Mahfouz, c/o National Commercial Bank', was also a beneficial shareholder. The Company and some Saudi partners, including Harb S. Al Zuhair, Sheik Kamal Adham, Prince Talal, Sheik Fahad Al-Athel, Ghazi Sultan, Mohammed Salem Ben Mahfouz and Mohammed O. Al Omair, plan to form a Saudi limited liability company which will build and manage a processing plant next to the Aromax® plant in Saudi Arabia." ---- Stockholders, covering the fiscal year ended December 31, 1996, Arabian American Development Company Harb S. Al Zuhair 1,310,000(2) 6.3% Fahad Mohammed Saleh Al-Athel 3,165,000(3) 15.1% Prince Talal Bin Abdul Aziz 1,500,000 7.3% Mohammad Salem Ben Mahfouz 1,500,000 7.3% Hatem El-Khalidi 609,000(4) 2.9% hatem El-Khalidi, a U.S.-educated geologist and the son of a former Jordanian prime minister, ---- He is listed as a shareholder in Hi Energy Technologies of Irvine Ca. A nuclear company tied to the US military but owned for a time by Phil Gurian and his associates. Gurian was a member of the DeCavalcante family and lived in South Florida opposite the family who ran BMI Inc. in Secaucus NJ. ---------- Fahad Mohammed Saleh Al-Athel Millions in secret commissions paid out for Saudi arms deal High Court testimony contradicts denial by Tory minister Thursday 4 March 1999 Hundreds of millions of pounds were paid in secret commissions on the massive Al Yamamah defence deal with Saudi Arabia, according to evidence disclosed to the High Court that contradicts repeated denials by the former government. Details of the payments, in which Jonathan Aitken was closely involved, emerged in testimony by an arms company executive shortly before the former cabinet minister's libel suit against the Guardian collapsed last week. David Trigger, a former executive of BMARC, the arms company where Mr Aitken was a director, admitted commissions were paid on the pounds 20 billion Al-Yamamah project. Mr Trigger also revealed that he negotiated a 15 per cent commission agreement with Sheikh Fahad al-Athel, one of Mr Aitken's business friends, for future contracts. Saudi Arabian law allows agents only 5 per cent. -------- Category:Characters Category:All